"When I dropped out, I dreamt of going back to school and playing with my friends," said Qoizhoin with a hint of sadness on her face.
"But now, I'm the happiest girl in the world, for my dream has come true and I'm going to study at a middle school in Chongqing," she said, her face turning bright.
Qoizhoin, a 14-year-old Tibetan girl, dropped out of school for financial reasons six years ago and became a nun at a monastery in Nyemo county of Tibet Autonomous Region. She was back to a local primary school two years later and now is going to study in a class for Tibetans in Chongqing, a prosperous city on the upper reaches of the Yangtze River.
On the gangway to a plane, bound for Chongqing, Qoizhoin bid good-bye to her father, who, overwhelmed by bittersweet emotions, said repeatedly, "It is the government that helped my girl realize her dream."
According to her father, Pudainba, the family could not afford to send Qoizhoin and their seven other children to school, so she had to leave school at the age of eight and was forced to enter a local monastery.
In 1996, the local government decided to exempt the tuition of those who had to leave school as well as offer free stationery and other living necessities to them. As a result, many teenage monks and nuns, including Qoizhoin, happily returned to the school.
Qiba Qoitsong, another Tibetan girl in the county, shares the same fate with Qoizhoin. Four years ago she was still a nun and now she is enrolled in a high school in Shaanxi Province.
This year in the county, apart from the two former nuns, another 14 former monks and nuns were enrolled in local high schools or inland schools.
Officials from the local government said that most dropouts had gotten help from local education and civil affairs departments because of their excellent academic performance. Also, their tuition, flights and living expenses will be covered by local government or schools they will study in.
"More and more lamas and local people welcome the practice and we will continue to let more and more Tibetan youngsters pursue their education so as to cultivate more talented Tibetans," said Yungdan Norbu, a senior official from the local government.
(Xinhua 10/03/2000)
